Year of the Queen: The Making of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert - The Musical (13 page)

Thankfully there’s no chance of me repeating this humiliation today. I feel nervous starting rehearsals but I’m not sick and I’ll definitely abstain from telling any dreamt jokes. I’ve prepared my briefcase with all necessary “first day of school” items: sharpened pencils, note pads, tape and tape recorder with fresh batteries, cut lunch, and my script with all my lines already highlighted. With Rolex precision I make my way to the bus stop knowing exactly what time it will arrive and when it will deposit me to rehearsals. I wait with waning optimism for the bus which has clearly been cancelled. Finally I get the next bus but am now officially running late.

I arrive at the Brent Street Studios where we’ll be rehearsing. This is a Sydney institution which
I’ve
even heard of, coming from Melbourne. Essentially it trains young performers from the age of nappies, right up to the Higher School Certificate. On any given day you can see flocks of perfectly poised children, jazz-running their way to their next tap, ballet or modern class, their perfectly poised mothers whispering their goodbyes, their dashed hopes and dreams of the stage now rolled up in the next generation of the family.

The studios sit smack in the middle of Waterloo, which is only a suburb on the way to somewhere else. The entrance to the building is inviting enough, perhaps to convince those hopeful parents that the entertainment industry isn’t that bad, and won’t gobble their little angels alive. I find A4 notices sticky taped to a wall in the foyer directing me to “PRISCILLA REHEARSALS”. I snake my way through the building following the signs. It’s like some incredible catacomb, with fading paint and the smell of pigeon shit. Corridors lead off in all directions like an Escher painting and I thank God I’m following signs. I wonder at what this place used to be, with its countless enormous spaces and huge, heavy rolling doors. In its hey-day, what kind of industry would have needed this much space, NASA? Only the arts would put up with the squalor it presents now. Several staircases and bewildering corridors later, I start doubting I’ll ever find my way out. Maybe I should be leaving a trail of breadcrumbs. Finally I make my way onto the fourth floor and through the steel sliding door to our rehearsal room. It’s enormous. The floor is exhausted linoleum and the wall to which the room faces is entirely made up of rain stained louvered windows. The roof sags with hessian fabric and mirrors completely line the side walls. The cold breeze blowing in from the industrial street below brings dust in with it even on this overcast day and I instantly feel grimy.

The room is vacant of people so I continue through to the offices and green room out the back to find everyone. I can hear the rumble of voices as I approach and I get a little tickle of excitement and nervousness. I round the corner and find the company all milling. As I arrive, Kath, our ‘pin-up’ of a stage manager, is ushering everyone into the rehearsal room to begin. She’s relieved I’ve finally arrived and I blame the Sydney bus service for my tardiness.

Scores of chairs have been set up facing an electric keyboard in front of the louvered windows. As we all file in, I hug the few members of the cast that I already know or have previously met and then head to Simon, who’s beaming to all and sundry. We greet warmly and swap jokes about the now famous goose from Saturday night. Ross smiles shyly and then roars with laughter. Then I shake Spud’s hand and he flashes me a smile. It’s the first time I’ve seen him since the spray he gave me at the second workshop, and he seems quite affable. Maybe all is forgiven. I feel heartened.

I take my seat with Tony and Daniel at the front of the room. Unlike a play where all the actors sit around the table for the first read through, in a musical, usually the principals sit at the front facing the creative team, and the ensemble sits behind. It’s a crazy kind of ‘billing’ pecking order.

Simon interrupts the loud rumbling of chat and once we’re all quiet, he beams at us all and says,

“Isn’t this exciting. We’re all going to be
VERY
FAMOUS.”

Everyone collapses with laughter. Then Tony Sheldon quips back,

“Yeah, just like the “Mamma Mia” cast.”

Simon begins proceedings with a short introduction of everyone in the room, starting with the creative team, then the crew and then the producers. Incredibly, he remembers everyone’s names. There must be sixty people in the room. When he gets to the cast, he tires and asks us to do it ourselves.

“It’s easy,” he says. “You just stand up and say, for example”, and he picks me out of the crowd, “Hi, I’m Jeremy Stanford and I’m an alcoholic.” So I stand and say,

“Hi, I’m Jeremy Stanford and I’m an alcoholic.”

The mantle gets past around. People stand and introduce themselves. Most have a witty quip to accompany their introduction: “Hi, I’m Michael, and I’m terrified”. But there’s a palpable sense of nervous excitement bristling through the room. Simon closes off by saying he can’t wait to get to work on the show and that although it’s going to be hard work we’ll all a have a lot of fun.

Then it’s Spud’s turn. He attacks his speech like a drill sergeant, warning us that the producers have spent
a lot of money
getting this show to this stage. He says they’ve been incredibly generous with their cash and time to make sure it becomes a success.

“The creative team have spent six months working their arses off to make this thing happen and the good news for them is, now it’s
your
turn. If this show bombs,” he warns, “it’ll put Australian musical theatre back five years. Not only that, but the buck stops with Simon. We’ll all get on with our lives, but for Simon, it’ll ruin him”.

We all look over to Simon, who is grimacing comically, like this is the first time he’d contemplated such a thought.

“Thanks Spud”, he says, resisting an anxious giggle.

“So I want to see nothing less than a one hundred percent commitment from all of you over the next six weeks,” Spud continues.

I look around the room at the excited, eager expressions on the faces of this collection of talented people, the cream of the crop from the auditions and wonder who on earth he’s talking to. As if anyone is going to let this opportunity slip. As if there’s single coaster in the room.

With our first read through being on Thursday, he tells us we’ll be learning the entire musical score for the show, harmonies and all before then. Some arrangements aren’t quite finished yet, so he’ll be in and out finishing things and at times his assistant Dave will hold the fort here.

We begin with a vocal warm up, which fortunately I take extremely seriously as, at the end of it, Spud gives us all a bollocking about how too many of us had slacked off on it. I thank God
my
conscience is clear.

First up is
Downtown
, the opening number in the show. I don’t sing in it, so I gratefully take the first half hour off. There are only a handful of us not in the song, so we retire to the green room which is populated with an array of vinyl couches from the seventies and coffee making facilities to caffeinate an army. Without such a huge throng to negotiate, I work the room more comfortably.

I meet up with Trevor Ashley, who was dressed as his drag character last time I met him, so effectively it’s our first meeting. If some drags need their wig, make-up and frock to unleash their personality this certainly isn’t the case with Trevor. The producers were desperate to include at least two members of the drag community in the show, not for window dressing but because they really wanted the community to be involved. Regardless of their intentions, Trevor is definitely not window dressing as he has an amazing voice and is brimming with talents as a writer, director, actor and musician in his own right. He has a permanent Luna Park smile on his face and is as big hearted with his attentions to others as with his willingness to talk about himself. I imagine him as equal parts generously loving and ferociously bitchy. Every second sentence is punctuated with a cackle reminiscent of the geese which fought over my stale bread on Lake Rotorua. I confide in him my nervousness about getting into drag, and my ability to perform it convincingly.

“Dahhhhhhhling,” he assures me, “I’ll look after you. We’ll go down to the Imperial and I’ll introduce you to Mitzi Macintosh.” Each sentence is slightly elongated like it’s being sung. “You’ll be fine don’t you worry about a thing.”

And I believe him. I feel like I’m going straight to ‘the source’.

Tony, Daniel and I get some time to bond. I don’t want to contrive it but it’s so important that the three of us click. Having worked with Tony on the workshops I know
we’ll
be fine. He’s the consummate professional and approaches everything with good cheer and hard work. Daniel is still a mystery to me. This morning he is understandably nervous. He confides in me that he’d been having panic attacks last week about beginning work today. Why wouldn’t he? I’ve got a lot more shows than him under my belt and I’m still terrified.

He hasn’t finished
Dusty
yet. Tonight he heads back to Adelaide for closing night, so we won’t have him again until Wednesday.

Michael Caton has joined the cast to play Bob. Although Billy Brown was rumoured to be playing it, somehow Michael has landed the role.

Soon Tony and I are called in to learn
Don’t Leave Me This Way
, the funeral song. It’s an ensemble song, but Tony takes the lead at the beginning. Sheet music is handed out and Spud starts to teach it. I scour the parts to see how high I’m going to have to sing. My stomach knots as I see nothing but high notes. Tony and I turn to each other and grimace. True to my word though, I belt it out as best as I can, knowing I won’t be able to do too much more of this before my voice is in rags.

Once we finish the funeral song Spud calls a break but asks me to join him at the piano. My heart sinks. I’m terrified I’m going to get another spray but I know I sang my guts out in the last session. I arrive at the piano with my heart in my mouth.

“I want you to hear the arrangement for
Say A Little Prayer
, he says.

3. Rehearsals day one. Spud leads us through, “Don’t Leave Me This Way”.

Suddenly I notice he’s brimming with excitement.

“It took me ages to come up with a way to arrange it that suits your voice and would work in the show, but I think I’ve got it. Have a listen”.

He’s practically shaking as he hands me the sheet music and hits ‘play’ on the C.D. player. I’m stunned and relieved. He encourages me to sing along with it very gently. It’s a beautiful, delicate arrangement which is perfect for my voice. It’s sparse, but has enough instrumentation to give it a mournful beauty. As I sing, I can see how proud he is of what he’s done and so he should be. When the song finishes we share a nod and I tell him I think it’s beautiful, that it will be a truly touching moment in the show.

In the break I meet David Page. He’s playing Jimmy, the indigenous man we bump into in the outback scene. This is such a coup to have him in the show and I’m honoured to work with him.

Simon and the rest of the creative team have all vanished. Spud is running the show now and it seems he will be until the whole score is learnt. As the day progresses, we plough our way through song after song. Everything is very high for both Tony and me and we’re both getting paler and paler as the day drags on. We’re also singing far more in the show than we thought we would be, and all of it is at the top of our ranges. Tony confides to me that he feels like the least talented person in the room. I don’t know how to respond to that - besides just giggling at how ludicrous that thought is, but in a funny way he’s hit the nail on the head. I feel exactly the same.

The final task for the day is to sing through all that we’ve learned so far. Clutching sheet music, we bash it out as best we can. And then that’s it. We’re dismissed. First day of rehearsal over and out.

I’m so relieved to be going home. I weave my way out of the building, my head throbbing with fatigue. I can’t wait to call Annie and speak to the kids. I’m already missing them dreadfully and all I want to do is go home to Melbourne tonight. I’ve set myself a regime of homework and exercise while I’m rehearsing. So once I get back to the Medina I have a swim, look at what we did today and then cook dinner. By the time all that’s done it’s bed time and the whole deal will start again tomorrow.

It’s Tuesday and the principles’ songs are scheduled for today. I’m terrified they’ll all be as high as the ensemble numbers and therefore be unsingable. I meet Tony as I arrive and I ask how his voice is doing. He rolls his eyes at me saying, “Not good”, and tells me he’d rung his mother, Toni Lamond, last night, freaking out about the keys being too high. She kept telling him, “Say something! Say something!” He vows to have a chat to Spud about it today. I’m relieved it’ll be him, not me.

Nick Hardcastle is filling in for Daniel today, while he’s in Adelaide, and he stays with us as the ensemble is shuffled off to the music room to drill harmonies.
Both Sides Now
has made it into the show, even after it went so badly at the second workshop. To our enormous relief, Spud has worked miracles with the arrangement for it. It’s in a lower key for a start, but he’s also put it into three part harmony and given us all parts we can reach.